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How Often Should I Measure My Circumferences and Skinfolds?

Why measurements are useful – and what they do (and don’t) influence

Daniel avatar
Written by Daniel
Updated this week

Regularly measuring your body circumferences and skinfolds is a powerful tool to make your physical progress visible—especially when your scale weight doesn’t seem to change much.

👉 Important to know:
These measurements do not affect your training plan or influence the algorithm in the app. They are purely for your own objective progress tracking—similar to progress photos.


What Do Circumference and Skinfold Measurements Indicate?

Circumference Measurements

Body circumferences (e.g., waist, hips, thighs, arms) help you assess changes in muscle mass and fat distribution. They are especially helpful if you:

  • Want to build muscle (e.g., growing arm or leg circumference)

  • Aim to lose fat (e.g., shrinking waist or abdominal circumference)

  • Pursue body recomposition (muscle gain while losing fat)

Skinfold Measurements (Caliper Testing)

Using a caliper, skinfolds are measured at defined points on the body. The thickness of these folds correlates with subcutaneous fat and provides a rough estimate of your body fat percentage. Key points:

  • A single measurement isn’t very accurate—but changes over time are highly meaningful.

  • Repeating the same measurement points under similar conditions (time of day, hydration, room temperature) significantly increases validity.

Estimating Body Fat Percentage (BF%)

You can visually estimate your BF% in the MyFitCoach app using photo references. While not medical-grade accurate, it’s more than sufficient to track trends and decide your training goal (bulking, cutting, or recomposition).


When and How Often Should You Measure?

At the Start of Your Coaching Journey

We recommend logging your initial values as soon as you begin with MyFitCoach:

  • Circumferences (waist, chest, arms, legs)

  • Skinfolds (e.g., abdomen, thigh, triceps, subscapular)

  • Optional: Estimated body fat percentage

These values serve as your personal baseline to objectively assess long-term progress.

Consistency: Every 4–5 Weeks
For meaningful trends, update your measurements every 4–5 weeks. Measuring more often may cause unnecessary worry, as short-term fluctuations (due to hydration, glycogen, or menstrual cycle) are perfectly normal.


Why These Measurements Are Worth It Long-Term

  • Muscle gain and fat loss often occur simultaneously—so your body changes even when the scale doesn’t.

  • Especially for advanced athletes, progress may be subtle. Circumference and skinfold tracking makes it visible.

  • Months from now, you’ll be glad to have those records—for motivation and reflection.


Logging Your Measurements in the App

Go to Profile → Body Measurements to access:

  • Circumference tracking

  • Skinfold measurement

  • Visual BF% estimation

All data can be updated and compared at any time.


Training Data ≠ Body Measurements

Your training plan is built entirely on your training performance—such as weight used, reps completed, and RIR.


Body measurements are a separate tool for visual and numeric tracking—similar to check-in photos or a training journal.

➡️ Important: Don’t get discouraged by single data points. Tracking is optional and is meant to help you, not stress you.
Short-term changes in measurements, skinfolds, or body weight are completely normal and can be influenced by sleep, hydration, stress, or hormone cycles.

What truly matters is the trend over weeks and months—not a single reading.
Love tracking? Great. Not your thing? That’s totally okay too.


📩 Still have questions or need help with your measurements?
Our support team is here for you:
support@myfitcoach.de

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